Head of School

Professor Shapiro in collaboration with other colleagues published the first paper on the ‘attentional blink’ phenomenon, which has attracted great interest on the part of many scientists. The original publication has been cited over 1000 times and approximately 500 reports on the same topic have followed from it. He employs a wide range of neuroscience approaches and tools in his ...

Professors

Professor of cognition and developmentDirector of Research for the School of Psychology

Ian Apperly is an experimental psychologist, and his main research interest is in “mindreading” – the ability to take other people’s perspectives for communication, co-operation, competition or deception. He is the author of over 80 journal articles, and the 2010 book, entitled “Mindreaders: The cognitive basis of theory of mind”.

Professor Bowman applies the methods of Cognitive Neuroscience, especially EEG and Neural Modelling, to understanding a spectrum of Cognitive phenomena, including conscious perception, temporal attention and subliminal search. Much of his work focuses on verifying the simultaneous Type/ Serial Token theory of temporal attention and working memory encoding, which he developed with Brad Wyble.

Chair in Psychiatry and Youth Mental HealthDirector of the Institute for Mental Health

Matthew Broome is an academic psychiatrist interested in the onset of mental disorders in young people. He has worked largely in the area of early psychosis, but is also interested in mood instability, autism, and in suicide and self-harm. His work has utilised functional neuroimaging, cognitive neuropsychology and epidemiology in his research and he has also worked in the philosophy and ethics ...

Professor Ole Jensen is a leading expert on neuronal oscillations in humans and animals. He is co-director of the Centre for Human Brain Heath. In his investigations he uses magnetoencephalography (MEG) in combination with other techniques. In 2016 he received the Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award and in 2018 the Joseph Chamberlain Award for Academic Advancement at University of ...

Professor Miall has been studying sensorimotor control for about 35 years, from his PhD in locusts, to crayfish, primates and for the last 15 years, working exclusively on human sensory and motor systems. He is particularly interested in the role of the cerebellum, in motor learning and in predictive control, and the role of the cerebellum in cognitive processes.

Chris Oliver is Professor of Neurodevelopmental Disorders and Director of the Cerebra Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders. His main research interests are behavioural, cognitive and emotional disorders in people with severe intellectual disability, genetic syndromes and autism spectrum conditions.

Professor Raymond is a visual perception/cognition specialist with a wide range of interests in how humans use and respond to complex visual information. She conducted the seminal work on the “Attention Blink”, a finding that launched intensive interest in labs around the world on how selective attention operates over time. Her work has included studies on visual attention across time ...

Readers

Reader in Imaging NeuroscienceDirector of the Birmingham University Imaging CentreCo-Director, Centre for Human Brain Health

Dr Bagshaw's main interest is in developing and applying non-invasive neuroimaging methods to questions in clinical and behavioural neuroscience. Current work in the Multimodal Integration Group (MIG)focuses on using EEG-fMRI to understand the influence of ongoing brain activity on evoked and behavioural responses, and to examine the localisation and functional significance of ...

My research examines children’s and adults’ thinking about time and knowledge. I am interested in how children become able to speculate about events in the past and future and how they handle uncertainty, and how adults’ apparently sophisticated thinking in these areas is often irrational. More information about my research and my lab can be found at www.sarahruthbeck.net.

Dr Andy Bremner is a developmental psychologist with expertise in multisensory perceptual development and the development of touch perception. He has particularly focused on examining how infants come to perceive their own bodies and their relation to the external world around them.

Dr Simon Hanslmayr is an expert in the role of brain oscillations for human cognition. His research addresses the question of how brain oscillations mediate long-term memory and attention in the human brain.

I am a behavioural neuroscientist primarily interested in the mechanisms and functions of memory processes. In particular, I currently study the phenomenon of memory reconsolidation, which may have applications in the understanding of and treatment of conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder and drug addiction.

Senior Lecturers

Dr Brittain studies the human motor system in health and disease. He is particularly interested in the way that brain stimulation can be used to understand the functioning of brain networks, and to alleviate disease symptoms.

Dr Anke Büttner is a psycholinguist and cognitive psychologist interested in the way people make sense of language. She also has an interest in learning and teaching, in particular in the effects of encouraging students to take ownership of the work and in the processes that take place during mentoring relationships.

Dr Jonathan Catling is a Senior Lecturer in Cognitive Psychology, and is an expert in research design and analysis. His research interests cover the fields of language acquisition, especially the impact of the ‘Age of Acquisition’ of language on cognitive functions in later life, and of resilience and the impact of general mental health and state anxiety on cognitive ...

Dr De Brito is a psychologist and director of the Social, Cognitive, Affective, and Neuroscience (SCAN) lab. Research in the SCAN lab focuses on understanding the mechanistic interplay between the social, cognitive, affective, and neurocognitive factors implicated in the development and persistence of antisocial and aggressive behaviour. A second strand of research examines those aspects among ...

Dr Galea is broadly interested in motor control. This ranges from the neural correlates of motor learning to stroke rehabilitation. At present, he is particularly interested in how reward/punishment influences our actions and can be used to alter the speed at which our motor system learns or retains new movements.

Dr. Dietmar Heinke teaches statistics at the School of Psychology. His research focuses on interdisciplinary brain research integrating experimental work in psychology with theoretical/computational modeling work. for more information see his personal webpages.

Dr Hickey uses tools from cognitive neuroscience – fMRI, EEG, MEG, TES, eye-tracking, and drug challenge – to study how our prior experience of the world dictates the manner in which we sense and perceive it.

Andrea Krott is a psycholinguist interested in language acquisition and the neural underpinning of language processing. Her current main research interest is the interplay of language acquisition and language processing with general cognitive functions.

Monica Lloyd joined the University part time on retirement from the National Offender Management Service. She helped to establish the new combined forensic and clinical doctorate training and her specialism is the Psychology of Extremism and Terrorism. She continues to offer consultancy to the Office for Security and Counter-Terrorism in the UK and is a Research Fellow with the Centre for ...

Dr Mazaheri is an expert on the role of oscillations in cognition and behaviour. His research focuses on the neural interactions underlying different facets of cognitive control in both the healthy and clinical populations.

Andrew Olson is a neuropsychologist who is interested in cognition and its various forms of breakdown and especially in the organization of language in the brain. He works with patient volunteers with aphasia, children, healthy adults and members of the deaf community.

Dr Kate Woodcock’s research interests can be summarised as aiming to investigate and explain human behaviour by considering multiple potential influences at different levels of explanation. For example, people’s genes, their brain structure, their brain functioning, cognitive, physiological and emotional functioning can all affect people’s behaviour both individually and in an ...

Lecturers

Matthew Brett has worked in neurology, cognitive psychology, and methods of brain imaging analysis. His recent interests have been in new methods of teaching data analysis, drawing on his experience in open source scientific computing and current developments in the data science movement.

Dr Ian Charest is a cognitive neuroscientist generally interested in investigating high-level visual and auditory representations using neuroimaging techniques such as EEG, MEG and fMRI. He studies the neurobiological bases of individual differences in personality and behavior, with particular interests in human perception, memory, and decision-making. His work is centered on the question of how ...

Dr Melissa Colloff conducts research on applied memory and cognition. Melissa mainly uses research and statistical modelling techniques from basic psychology to investigate memory and decision-making in the legal system. Melissa is interested in both theoretical and applied aspects.

The aim of Dr Cruse’s research is to improve clinical practice following severe brain injury through the application of methods from cognitive electrophysiology. By identifying residual neural and cognitive mechanisms, it is possible to improve the accuracy of diagnoses and prognoses, and gain a more accurate understanding of how the brain supports consciousness and cognition.

Dr Rory T. Devine is a developmental psychologist with expertise in children’s social and cognitive development, longitudinal research methods and psychometrics. His research focuses on individual differences in ‘higher-order’ cognitive skills from infancy to adulthood. His work seeks to understand: (1) why children differ from one another in their ability to reason about ...

Dr Di Luca investigates the mechanisms of human perception using psychophysical methods and computational modeling. The goal of his research is to understand how the brain progressively builds the perception of the environment by picking up information through actions and by integrating sensations over time.

Davinia Fernández-Espejo’s main goal is to understand how the brain supports consciousness and what goes wrong for patients to become entirely unaware after severe brain injury. She uses techniques such as MRI (structural and functional), tDCS, and behavioural approaches in both healthy volunteers and patients with a disorder of consciousness to test hypotheses about ...

Dr Andy Fox is a clinical psychologist specialising in complex and enduring mental health needs, particularly psychosis. Much of his work involves developing an understanding of the social-psychological factors important in complex mental health difficulties and trying to work out what to do about them to improve people's well-being.

Dr Carmel Mevorach is a cognitive neuroscientist focusing on mechanisms of top-down attention control, which lie at the heart of various cognitive functions. His research also aims to unravel how individual factors (such as autistic traits or normal aging) mediate mechanisms of attention, including on the neural level.

Joint Nottingham and Birmingham Lecturer and Anne McLaren Research Fellow

Dr Mullinger is an expert in simultaneous EEG-fMRI. She focuses on understanding the sources of the EEG artefacts and how to reduce them at source. Using the best EEG-fMRI techniques available she investigates neurovascular coupling to better understand brain function.

The aim of Dr Richards’ research is to reduce negative clinical outcomes for individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders. Her work with children with autism and children with rare genetic syndromes has thus far focused on reducing self-injury, improving sleep disorders and understanding the impact of premature birth. Her research uses experimental, epidemiological, single case and ...

My research focuses on sentence level language processing, mostly syntactic and semantic processing. I am especially interested in how these core language processes work, how the workings change throughout the lifespan, and how they are instantiated in the brain.

Dr Stephenson is a lecturer in Forensic Psychology for the Forensic Psychology Practice Doctorate (ForenPsyD) and the Continued Professional Development (CPD) programmes. Her research projects have focused on female offending, the rehabilitation of violent and sex offenders in the UK, youth offending, alternatives to accredited treatment programmes (e.g. applied theatre), and alternatives to ...

Dr Stewart is an experimental Social Psychologist with research interests in social cognition, intergroup relations, and ageing. Much of his research focuses on how goals and environments influence automatic and controlled thinking to produce prejudice and influence intergroup relations and decision making.

Dr Andrew Surtees is an expert in social cognition, autism and mental health. He combines cutting-edge research on social understanding in typical and atypical populations with practice as a Clinical Psychologist.

Dr Maria Wimber is a cognitive neuroscientist interested in human long-term memory. Her work is centred around the question how remembering adaptively changes our memories, causing some memories to become more permanent, and others to be forgotten. She uses a combination of neuroimaging (fMRI), electrophysiological (EEG/MEG) and behavioural methods to ...

Birmingham Fellows and Bridge Fellows

Dr Chechlacz is broadly interested in understanding how variability in the neurochemical, structural and functional organisation of the brain affect cognitive functions and relates to individual differences in human behaviour and in susceptibility to cognitive ageing and mental health problems. Her work combines cognitive assessment of attentional functions with spherical deconvolution ...

Dr Cook’s work investigates action and social cognition in typically developed adults and those with autism spectrum conditions.

With respect to action Dr Cook and her colleagues have shown that autistic adults move with subtly different kinematics compared to typical controls (Cook, Blakemore and Press, 2013, Brain). Such atypical kinematics can impact on the perception, ...

Dr Steve Mayhew conducts a lot of simultaneous EEG-fMRI experiments in an effort to better understand the coupling between single-trial variability in electrophysiological and haemodynamic measurements of brain responses, and how interactions between ongoing brain processes and external events are intrinsic to the function of the brain.

Maria Michail is a senior researcher in youth mental health and her main interests lie within the field of youth suicide prevention, self-harm as well as resilience. Maria’s work aims at highlighting through translational research the importance of early intervention and prevention of mental ill health in the critical ages of 12 to 25 years. Ultimately, her work aims to inform the ...

Dr Hyojin Park is an expert on neural oscillatory mechanisms associated with human speech and memory. Her PhD work focused on the functional role of brain oscillations and how they support network interactions (cross-frequency coupling) in attention and memory. Her current research is focused on the topic of audiovisual speech processing, integration, and communication.

Dr Staresina's research focuses on the neural mechanisms underlying episodic memory in humans. He is interested in how different brain mechanisms – in particular subregions of the medial temporal lobe (MTL) - contribute to successful encoding, consolidation and recollection of multiple event details. To address this question, he uses a combination of functional magnetic resonance imaging ...

Dr Berger joined the group of Professor Ole Jensen as a Marie Curie Research Fellow in 2017. She is using MEG and EEG-TMS to investigate how flexible allocation of attention and inhibition can be mapped looking at brain oscillatory activity.

Dr Geoff Brookshire’s research focuses on the role of cortical oscillations in perception and cognition. In this work, he uses electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalography (MEG), along with computational simulations.

My research interests focus on adolescent mental health. They include the early detection and intervention of mental illness, risks and resilience associated with the development of mental illness, and primary and secondary prevention methods.

Dr. Davies has recently completed a PhD entitled ‘The practice of crime linkage’. She is now working as a research fellow in the School of Psychology, and as the research coordinator for the Centre for Crime, Justice and Policing.

Marc Exton-McGuiness is a postdoctoral researcher in the Memory Persistence Lab. He is investigating how disruption of instrumental memory reconsolidation could be used to diminish maladaptive reward-seeking behaviours.

Dr Charlotte Flavell is a post-doctoral research fellow in the Memory Persistence Lab. She is chiefly interested in the molecular mechanisms associated with memory reconsolidation and the ways that this can be applied to maladaptive memories, such as those associated with PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) and addiction.

Lowri is a Research Associate on the European PRONIA study and will soon be starting a Research Fellow position with Dr Rachel Upthegrove working on a suicide prevention impact case study. Alongside her research work, Lowri holds a Teaching Fellow position at the School of Psychology, where she leads on the ‘Adult Neuropsychological Syndromes’ final year module.

Dr Kareen Heinze is a HCPC registered clinical psychologist. Her research interests are in the field of youth mental health and using dimensional approaches to mental health, such as clinical staging. She is especially interested in the neurobiological bases of mental health problems as measured by MRI and cortisol and ways to improve mental health, e.g. by means of exercise.

Dr Tamas Minarik is a postdoctoral researcher in Professor Ole Jensen’s Neuronal Oscillations research group. His work looks into the neuronal response to Rapid Frequency Tagging using MEG. Moreover, he is working on the implementation of the preprocessing and analysis pipeline of MEG data. Dr Minarik is also employed by the Ludwig-Maximilians University and is working with Professor ...

I am a research fellow at the Cerebra Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders, School of Psychology. My main research interests include the study of behavioural phenotypes in neurodevelopmental disorders associated with intellectual disability.

Dr Yali Pan is a postdoctoral researcher in neuronal oscillations group. She is interested into the neural mechanism underlying brain cognitions. Her research fields focus on visual working memory, reading and spatial attention, using the technique of MEG and iEEG (intracranial EEG).

Sleep is essential for the strengthening (i.e. consolidation) of memories, probably due their spontaneous reactivation during sleep. Thomas is interested in how these reactivation processes can be manipulated experimentally, as well as in their neural underpinnings. To tackle these questions he uses electrophysiological recordings (MEG, EEG, iEEG) and behavioural testing.

Dr Rodika Sokoliuk is working as a postdoctoral researcher in Dr Simon Hanslmayr’s group, focusing on the role of alpha oscillations in visual attention. She is a member of one of the rare research teams, using the technique of co-registration of EEG and 7 Tesla fMRI.

Dr Alexander Zhigalov acquired extensive training in the field of cognitive neuroscience and medical imaging. His main expertise is in the methods development for MEG data acquisition and data analysis.

Dr Zumer [j.zumer (at) bham.ac.uk] is interested in quantifying the neuronal mechanisms underlying perception, attention and sensory integration by measuring local activity and inter-regional brain connectivity. She examines the spatiotemporal profile of both neural (MEG/EEG) and haemodynamic (functional MRI) data over a variety of experimental manipulations, to aid the understanding of ...

Clinical Lecturers

Dr Michelle Fisher is the Clinical Director for the Clinical Psychology Doctorate Course. She has worked as Clinical Director since 2012 and prior to this she was a Clinical Tutor since 2004. She qualified in 2000 from the Birmingham Clinical Psychology Doctorate Course and has a background in working in adult mental health.

I am a Senior Academic Tutor and Admissions Tutor for the ClinPsyD Programme. I supervise research within the area of health psychology, focusing mainly on coeliac disease, cancer and end of life care. I organise the ClinPsyD health psychology teaching module and support the organisation of the MRes Clinical programme.

The Clinical Tutor role includes liaison with placement providers within the NHS and third sector, organizing placements, training supervisors and working with all parties if any difficulties occur. In addition Elizabeth is involved in coordinating the appraisal tutor and personal tutor systems, organizing Clinical Presentations and reflective practice groups. More recently she has become ...

Teresa is a Clinical Psychologist specialising in working with children, young people and their families. She has a special interest in autism spectrum, pathological demand avoidance and chronic health conditions. As a clinical tutor on the Clinical Psychology Doctorate Programme she oversees the personal and professional issues curriculum model and is involved in the child module teaching and ...

I am currently working as a Research Fellow in the School of Psychology. I previously worked as a Senior Academic Tutor teaching, supporting and supervising students on both the Clinical Psychology Doctorate and MSc in CBT Programmes. I am a Clinical Psychologist who specialises in using CBT and am BABCP accredited. My clinical interests are in mental health conditions such as anxiety, depression ...

Theresa joined the Clinical Psychology Doctorate in May 2000. Her main research interests are in the area of brain injury rehabilitation and include: factors affecting engagement in rehabilitation, compensatory memory strategies, outcome measurement and navigation/route learning in people with acquired brain injury. Her clinical work is based at West Midlands Rehabilitation Service, ...

I am a Clinical Psychologist. I work in neuropsychological rehabilitation, both in clinical practice and in research. Research interests include family relationships in acquired brain injury and dementia, errorless learning, and the coping responses of those with an acquired brain injury (particularly self-identity).

Honorary Academics

Professor Anthony Beech is an Emeritus Professor in the Centre for Applied Psychologyat the University of Birmingham, UK. He has authored over 180 peer-reviewed articles, 50 book chapters and six books in the area of forensic science/criminal justice. In 2009 he received the Significant Achievement Award from the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers in Dallas, and the Senior Award ...

Dr Richard Bennett works as a Lecturer on the CBT programmes, where he leads the Postgraduate Diploma in High Intensity CBT. He has been in this post since 2010. Richard worked for over 20 years in the National Health Service, developing expertise in a range of cognitive behavioural psychotherapies, including Cognitive Therapy, Rational Emotive Behaviour ...

I am an applied researcher embedded in Birmingham mental health services. I’m a clinical psychologist by training and act as clinical director to the YouthSpace youth mental health service (www.youthspace.me) and Director of research and Innovation for Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Foundation Trust.

David Booth investigates the ways in which an individual's life works. His research and teaching centre on the processes in the mind that situate actions and reactions by people, members of other species and, indeed, socially intelligent engineered systems.

Professor Copello's research has led to major impacts on addiction treatment in the UK in recent years. He was Principal Investigator in the MRC funded UK Alcohol Treatment Trial, the largest trial of alcohol treatments conducted in the UK that informs effective and cost effective delivery of psychosocial interventions for alcohol problems. He led the development of a social and family ...

Professor Leam A. Craig is a Consultant Forensic and Clinical Psychologist and Partner at Forensic Psychology Practice Ltd. He is Professor (Hon) of Forensic Psychology at the Centre for Forensic and Criminological Psychology, University of Birmingham.

He has been appointed Fellow of the British Psychological Society.

He has authored over 70 research articles and chapters in a range of research ...

Geraldine is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and currently works part-time in the NHS, where she leads a Skills Development Service, and part-time at the University of Birmingham, where she directs CBT Programmes. She is an accredited therapist, trainer and supervisor with the BABCP, and a Chartered Clinical Psychologist with the BPS.

Dr Hermine Graham is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Lecturer on the Doctorate in Clinical Psychology course at the University of Birmingham, UK. She has led a programme of collaborative research and service innovation in the NHS focused on the integration of substance misuse treatment into mental health services. This innovation has been quoted as a model of good practice in ...

Dr Gillian Harris has worked, throughout her career, on food acceptance and refusal in childhood and infancy. She is seen as a foremost expert in this field. Her clinical work has concentrated on interventions with children who refuse food; primarily because of ongoing medical conditions or developmental difference or delay.

Dr Camillo Porcaro is a computational neuroscientist with a core interest in the development of analytical methods for extracting information from non-invasive measures of brain activity. His research focuses on identifying functional brain sources from data obtained through neuroimaging techniques.

John Rose is a clinical psychologist with a particular interest in working with people who have Intellectual Disabilities and works on the Clin Psy D course at the University. He is also Director of the new Forensic Clinical Doctorate that had its first intake in September 2013.

He also works for St Andrews Health Care and has a strong emphasis on integrating research and teaching ...

My research aims to understand the health paradox of adolescence - the years between 12 and 25 are a time of great physical fitness, yet this is the period during which 75% of all mental disorders have their onset. Why should this be the case? Clearly changes in the brain are likely culprits, but how they interact with genetic and environmental factors to produce illness is unclear.

Academic related

Dr Wilson has over 10 years’ experience in the field of Magnetic Resonance, with a particular interest in MR spectroscopy. He currently provides MR Physics support for research at Birmingham University Imaging Centre (BUIC).